Was this Britain's first black queen?

Guardian ^ | 12 Mar 2009 | Stuart Jeffries

[BGHater]

Queen Charlotte was the wife of George III and, like him, of German descent. But did she also have African ancestry?

Queen Charlotte died nearly two centuries ago but is still celebrated in her namesake American city. When you drive from the airport in North Carolina, you can't miss the monumental bronze sculpture of the woman said to be Britain's first black queen, dramatically bent backwards as if blown by a jet engine. Downtown, there is another prominent sculpture of Queen Charlotte, in which she's walking with two dogs as if out for a stroll in 21st-century America.

Street after street is named after her, and Charlotte itself revels in the nickname the Queen City - even though, shortly after the city was named in her honour, the American War of Independence broke out, making her the queen of the enemy. And the city's art gallery, the Mint museum, holds a sumptuous 1762 portrait of Charlotte by the Scottish portrait painter Allan Ramsay, showing the Queen of England in regal robes aged 17, the year after she married George III.

Charlotte is intrigued by its namesake. Some Charlotteans even find her lovable. "We think your queen speaks to us on lots of levels," says Cheryl Palmer, director of education at the Mint museum. "As a woman, an immigrant, a person who may have had African forebears, botanist, a queen who opposed slavery - she speaks to Americans, especially in a city in the south like Charlotte that is trying to redefine itself."

Sir Allan Ramsay’s 1762 portrait of Queen Charlotte in the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina.

[BGHater]

ping.

Sigh.

This one is gonna go political in about two seconds.

[JoeProBono]

[Tax-chick]

a historian called Mario de Valdes y Cocom. He argues that her features, as seen in royal portraits, were conspicuously African, and contends that they were noted by numerous contemporaries. He claims that the queen, though German, was directly descended from a black branch of the Portuguese royal family, related to Margarita de Castro e Souza, a 15th-century Portuguese noblewoman nine generations removed, whose ancestry she traces from the 13th-century ruler Alfonso III and his lover Madragana, whom Valdes takes to have been a Moor and thus a black African.

What a bunch of claptrap. Racist claptrap, too ... the fact that she was ugly "proves" a distant African ancestor? Academics will make up *anything* to get published!

[eastsider]

That’s a man, baby ...

[wardaddy]

Black Portugese are not negroid, they are Moors....north African Arab descended.

crazy, who writes this stuff?

[BGHater]

That’s not ‘racist’ at all.

[PeteB570]

Sigh.

It just bothers me on how far back some would try and go to claim “black”.

Like 9 generations back with everybody else white? I would not call somebody like that “black”.

that 1762 picture don’t look black to me either.

[Tax-chick]

It’s not racist to say that if a woman is ugly, she must be black, or have an African ancestor?

[OneWingedShark]

LOL

[neb52]

Ramsey embellished her “mulatto face”. Other paintings do not. I think Ramsey had an agenda.

[BGHater]

‘a historian called Mario de Valdes y Cocom. He argues that her features, as seen in royal portraits, were conspicuously African, and contends that they were noted by numerous contemporaries. He claims that the queen, though German, was directly descended from a black branch of the Portuguese royal family, related to Margarita de Castro e Souza, a 15th-century Portuguese noblewoman nine generations removed, whose ancestry she traces from the 13th-century ruler Alfonso III and his lover Madragana, whom Valdes takes to have been a Moor and thus a black African.’

Nothing in that excerpt is racist. It might be bigoted, but not racist.

[fieldmarshaldj]

Guilty !

[WellyP]

What is the German translation that means, Don’t ask, Don’t tell!

[BossLady]

I agree! Her ugliness could have very well came from several of the royal families I can thing of right off the bat! LOL!

Also...."black branch of the Portuguese royal family"

Most probably, she had some of the Moor blood in her which is generally not considered 'negro' but Berber and Arab descent.

[RushIsMyTeddyBear]

That’s a man, baby ...
__________________________________

I think you’re right! IT’S A TRAP! ;)

[Cowboy Bob]

This must be from the same people who claim that Cleopatra is African!

BTW, the Russians consider the people from the Caucasus to be "Black". That does not mean that are African!

[mjp]

Claims of African ancestry

[DM1]

It's A Trap!

[Tax-chick]

Okay, whatever.